-Caveat Lector-
from:
http://www.history.rochester.edu/fuels/tarbell/MAIN.HTM
<A HREF="http://www.history.rochester.edu/fuels/tarbell/MAIN.HTM">THE HISTORY
OF THE STANDARD OIL COMPANY
</A>
-----
THE HISTORY OF THE STANDARD OIL COMPANY
BY
IDA M. TARBELL
------------------------------------------------------------------------
CONVERTED TO ELECTRONIC FORMAT BY NALINDA SAPUKOTANA AT UNIVERSITY OF
ROCHESTER
------------------------------------------------------------------------
TABLE OF CONTENTS
LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS
PREFACE
CHAPTER 1
PAGES 1 THRU 20
PAGES 21 THRU 37
CHAPTER 2
PAGES 38 THRU 52
PAGES 53 THRU 69
CHAPTER 3
PAGES 70 THRU 85
PAGES 86 THRU 103
CHAPTER 4
PAGES 104 THRU 116
PAGES 117 THRU 128
CHAPTER 5
PAGES 129 THRU 147
PAGES 148 THRU 166
CHAPTER 6
PAGES 167 THRU 186
PAGES 187 THRU 207
CHAPTER 7
PAGES 208 THRU 224
PAGES 225 THRU 240
CHAPTER 8
PAGES 241 THRU 262
JOHN D. ROCKEFELLER
*The text was obtained from the book The History of The Standard Oil
Company by Ida M. Tarbell. Copyright, 1904, by McCLURE, PHILLIPS AND CO.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
This was done as a student project in a class on the history of energy.
Comments are welcomed!
Maintained by Morris A. Pierce
26 June 1996
=====
PREFACE
This work is the outgrowth of an effort on the part of the editors of
McClure's Magazine to deal concretely in their pages with the trust
question. In order that their readers might have a clear and succinct
notion of the processes by which a particular industry passes from the
control of the many to that of the few, they decided a few years ago to
publish a detailed narrative of the history of the growth of a
particular trust. The Standard Oil Trust was chosen for obvious reasons.
It was the first in the field, and it has furnished the methods, the
charter, and the traditions for its followers. It is the most perfectly
developed trust in existence; that is, it satisfies most nearly the
trust ideal of entire control of the commodity in which it deals. Its
vast profits have led its officers into various allied interests, such
as railroads, shipping, gas, copper, iron, steel, as well as into banks
and trust companies, and to the acquiring and solidifying of these
interests it has applied the methods used in building up the Oil Trust.
It has led in the struggle against legislation directed against
combinations. Its power in state and Federal government, in the press,
in the college, in the pulpit, is generally recognised. The perfection
of the organisation of the Standard, the ability and daring with which
it has carried out its projects, make it the pre-eminent trust of the
world-the one whose story is best fitted to illuminate the subject of
combinations of capital.
Another important consideration with the editors in deciding that the
Standard Oil Trust was the best adapted to illus-
[vii]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE
trate their meaning, was the fact that it is one of the very few
business organisations of the country whose growth could be traced in
trustworthy documents. There is in existence just such documentary
material for a history of the Standard Oil Company as there is for a
history of the Civil War or the French Revolution, or any other national
episode which has divided men's minds. This has come about largely from
the fact that almost constantly since its organisation in 1870 the
Standard Oil Company has been under investigation by the Congress of the
United States and by the Legislatures of various states in which it has
operated, on the suspicion that it was receiving rebates from the
railroads and was practising methods in restraint of free trade. In 1872
and again in 1876 it was before Congressional committees, in 1879 it was
before examiners of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania and before
committees appointed by the Legislatures of New York and of Ohio for
investigating railroads. Its operations figured constantly in the debate
which led up to the creation of the Interstate Commerce Commission in
1887, and again and again since that time the Commission has been called
upon to examine directly or indirectly into its relation with the
railroads.
In 1888, in the Investigation of Trusts conducted by Congress and by the
state of New York, the Standard Oil Company was the chief subject for
examination. In the state of Ohio, between 1882 and 1892, a constant
warfare was waged against the Standard in the courts and Legislature,
resulting in several volumes of testimony. The Legislatures of many
other states concerned themselves with it. This hostile legislation
compelled the trust to separate into its component parts in 1892, but
investigation did not cease; indeed, in the last great industrial
inquiry, conducted by the Commission appointed by President McKinley,
the Standard Oil Company was constantly under discussion, and hundreds
of pages of
[viii]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE
testimony on it appear in the nineteen volumes of reports which the
Commission has submitted.
This mass of testimony, all of it submitted under oath it should be
remembered, contains the different charters and agreements under which
the Standard Oil Trust has operated, many contracts and agreements with
railroads, with refineries, with pipe-lines, and it contains the
experiences in business from 1872 up to 1900 of multitudes of
individuals. These experiences have exactly the quality of the personal
reminiscences of actors in great events, with the additional value that
they were given on the witness stand, and it is fair, therefore, to
suppose that they are more cautious and exact in statements than many
writers of memoirs are. These investigations, covering as they do all of
the important steps in the development of the trust, include full
accounts of the point of view of its officers in regard to that
development, as well as their explanations of many of the operations
over which controversy has arisen. Hundreds of pages of sworn testimony
are found in these volumes from John D. Rockefeller, William Roc
kefeller, Henry M. Flagler, H. H. Rogers, John D. Archbold, Daniel O'Day
and other members of the concern.
Aside from the great mass of sworn testimony accessible to the student
there is a large pamphlet literature dealing with different phases of
the subject, and there are files of the numerous daily newspapers and
monthly reviews, supported by the Oil Regions, in the columns of which
are to be found not only statistics but full reports of all
controversies between oil men. No complete collection of this voluminous
printed material has ever been made, but several small collections
exist, and in one or another of these I have been able to find
practically all of the important documents relating to the subject. Mrs.
Roger Sherman of Tltusville, Pennsylvania, owns the largest of these
collections, and in it are to be found copies of the rarest pamphlets.
Lewis Emery, Jr., of
[ix]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE
Bradford, the late E. G. Patterson of Titusville, the late Henry D.
Lloyd, author of "Wealth vs. Commonwealth," William Hasson of Oil City,
and P. C. Boyle, the editor of the Oil City Derrick, have collections of
value, and they have all been most generous in giving me access to their
books.
But the documentary sources of this work are by no means all printed.
The Standard Oil Trust and its constituent companies have figured in
many civil suits, the testimony of which is still in manuscript in the
files of the courts where the suits were tried. These manuscripts have
been examined on the ground, and in numerous Instances full copies of
affidavits and of important testimony have been made for permanent
reference and study. I have also had access to many files of private
correspondence and papers, the most important being that of the officers
and counsel of the Petroleum Producers' Union from 1878 to 1880, that
covering the organisation from 1887 to 1895 of the .various independent
companies which resulted in the Pure Oil Company, and that containing
the material prepared by Roger Sherman for the suit brought in 1897 by
the United States Pipe Line against certain of the Standard companies
under the Sherman anti-trust law.
As many of the persons who have been active in the development of the
oil industry are still living, their help has been freely sought. Scores
of persons in each of the great oil centres have been interviewed, and
the comprehension and interpretation of the documents on which the work
is based have been materially aided by the explanations which the actors
in the events under consideration were able to give.
When the work was first announced in the fall of 1901, the Standard Oil
Company, or perhaps I should say officers of the company, courteously
offered to give me all the assistance in their power, an offer of which
I have freely taken advantage. In accepting assistance from Standard men
as from independents I distinctly stated that I wanted facts, and that I
[x]
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE
reserved the right to use them according to my own judgment of their
meaning, that my object was to learn more perfectly what was actually
done-not to learn what my informants thought of what had been done. It
is perhaps not too much to say that there is not a single important
episode in the history of the Standard Oil Company, so far as I know it,
or a notable step in its growth, which I have not discussed more or less
fully with officers of the company. It is needless to add that the
conclusions expressed in this work are my own.
I. M. T.
[xi]
--[more at site]--
Aloha, He'Ping,
Om, Shalom, Salaam.
Em Hotep, Peace Be,
Omnia Bona Bonis,
All My Relations.
Adieu, Adios, Aloha.
Amen.
Roads End
Kris
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